Shocking revelation?

[manephelien]

J K Rowling outs Hogwarts character

Now that's going to set the cat even further among the pigeons with the fundies who hate Potter because they think the books promote witchcraft.

[Wiglaf]

So that was why he was so helpful to Potter.
Actually, if he was outed in the book series, it probably would have been more an issue than the witchcraft. At least that many excused as fantasy. A gay professor seeing Potter alone in his office all the time would have caused an uproar in some groups.

[Toraspanda]

What I don't understand is why Rowling felt moved to make this revelation at all. What does it add to the character? How is it relevant in any way? So what if Dumbledore was gay. He seems to have been entirely celibate, at least during his long career at Hogwarts. Lucius Malfoy would have outed him in a heartbeat if there'd been the slightest suspicion of any hanky-panky with students!

[pyan]

Originally Posted by Toraspanda

What I don't understand is why Rowling felt moved to make this revelation at all. What does it add to the character? How is it relevant in any way?

Am I being cynical by wondering if this is a way of keeping HP (or JKR, more likely) in the limelight, now the book series has ended?

[HoopyFrood]

I was actually going to post something along those lines. Cynical minds think alike, it seems

[Culhwch]

Cynicism aside, I think it does serve to add another layer to the seventh book. Dumbeldore's actions in regards to his relationship with Grindelwald were of major focus, and the revelation that he may have been blinded by love does lend a new facet to the narrative. The fact that it fell to Rowling to drop this information outside of the book would seem to suggest she failed in the storytelling; if it's of such relevance, it surely should have been at least more strongly alluded to, if not flat-out thrown in our faces, in the novel.

[pyan]

Or she's only just thought of it.....

Well, the books are written, she can't change them....She's said there'll be no more, apart from the possible "Guide"...so, as Toraspanda said, what does a revelation like this actually achieve, apart from putting up the backs of a huge swathe of parents, and making headlines?

"Pah", say I, cynically...

[the_faery_queen]

iu think it's stupid that she came out with this statement now. personally i couldn't care less, i don' tlike potter, but the fact she brought it out now seems to me that she just wants to draw more attention to herself. like she doesn't have enough

[Curt Chiarelli]

Originally Posted by HoopyFrood

I was actually going to post something along those lines. Cynical minds think alike, it seems

Indeed they do!

And to hell (well, not literally anyway) with the Christian Right and their agenda.

Let's pour a little extra salt into this particular open wound, shall we? Wouldn't it be fun if a part of Dumbledore's "troubled past" was that he was a Communist who fought with the Lincoln Brigade in the Spanish Civil War, but fell in love with a dashing, but ruthless Fascist commander . . . .





But really, look on the bright side . . . . could you imagine Dumbledore getting it on with Severus Snape? Pre-lubed and everything . . . . how nice.

[dustinzgirl]

Oh no, someone wrote a book with a gay character in it! That must be totally shocking and new, since nobody was ever gay before 1950.

For the love of pete, you would think that people would have better things to bitch about with all the war, famine, disease, rape, murder, and so forth going on in the world.

[manephelien]

I'm not bitching at all, just a bit cynical as to her reasons for revealing it now.

[dustinzgirl]

Originally Posted by manephelien

I'm not bitching at all, just a bit cynical as to her reasons for revealing it now.

Not you, them. Not them that posted in here, but them as in other thems.

Does that make sense?

[murphy]

Originally Posted by dustinzgirl

Oh no, someone wrote a book with a gay character in it! That must be totally shocking and new, since nobody was ever gay before 1950.

Mary Renault was writing about that in the 1930s.

[HoopyFrood]

Originally Posted by Curt Chiarelli

Pre-lubed and everything . . . . how nice.

Curt...


Jeez.





I told a couple of my friends about this earlier and they both got confused: "What, the actor who plays Dumbledore is gay?"
"No...the character."
"Oh.......what?"
"The character!"
We're all so confused purely because it's just so random that she's chosen now to tell everyone; like Cul says, it wasn't particularly strong writing if she was trying to show it in the book.

[pyan]

Originally Posted by murphy

Mary Renault was writing about that in the 1930s.

Callisthenes of Olynthus was writing about a homosexual character in the fourth century BC, if it comes to that!